THE LOAFER IN THE STRET.

Globe, Volume I, Issue 2, 2 June 1874, Page 2

THE LOAFER IN THE STRET.

There’s a nice man I know here, let us call him Gumpy Thumbs, who is single, has lots of money, jolly place, horse and trap, Brahmah fowls, bull dog, and false teeth, and yet that man ain’t jhappy. When I first know him, he was a jovial, chirrippiug skittle, and what an Irishman would call the “ hoigut of company.” Now melancholy has marked him for her own. He no longer treads the earth with elastic step. He won’t smile. He is pining away gradually, and is in all wayis a sad object. “ Gumps,” I said lately, “ what is the meaning of such funereal thusments ? Why this lugubrious pallor 1 Why this downcast nose 1 Explain to me this deep mystery.” “ My friend,” said Gumps, “ consolation avails not. I have resided here many years. I have, I hope, done my duty towards my fellow citizens, and I am deserted in my old age by them. I have watched the papers lately carefully, and I find I am almost the only individual in the province who has not received a presentation. What have I done that I should bo treated as a Pariah ? I don’t care about purses of sovereigns. It’s not the value of the thing ; but to reside in a community where every living soul with the least pretension to respectability has received a testimonial except myself, is more than I can stand.” With these few remarks he wept, say a kilderkin, of superior tears, and as he didn’t offer me any beer I saw it was no good trying to console him, so I left. I’m sorry for poor old Gumpythumbs, though. I should like to see him get as numerous a testimonial as Mr Pender, but I’m afraid he don’t deserve it quite so much. I should like to belong to the Chamber of Commerce. I observe that the Chamber takes up matters connected with the good of trade generally, such as bankruptcy and the like. On this ground I should like to belong to the body. I’ve got a real commercial mind, and I don’t think I’m over-rating myself when I say 1 have probably more liberal ideas about credit thau any man in the Chamber. My relatives have most of them had a commercial bias tending mainly towards the hemp business. Some of them were first class judges of oakum, and others have to suspend operations through a sudden fall in rope. Being a friend to commerce, I want to bring to the notice of the Board an incident that recently occurred to mo. I took a job to weed a garden for an absentee. If ever you take a similar bit of work, you’ll find it best just to cut off the heads of the weeds with a Dutch hoe. By this meaus, if the garden be of any size, the weeds you started on will have grown up again by the time you get to the end, and thus you will do a fair thing by your employer. Owing to circumstances, which need not be gone into here, I got a small cheque and the sack at the end of a fortnight. I kept the cheque for two or three days and then presented it. There wore not sufficient funds. I saw ray employer, and he said that had I put it in the day before it would have beeu all right, but he promised to adjust the matter. It aint adjusted yet. I’ve a very commercial mind, but I don’t take auy pleasure in such things as these. I’m that commercial now, that when I do get a cheque again wild omnibusses horses won’t keep me from going to the hank; five minutes after receiving it,

A good- story comes to me from down south. In a township sufficiently rising to be possessed of 1 banks, one of the managers was honoured by a call from a gentleman who wanted an overdraft. Tin was not what bank managers would cons-idir a first class nibble in a business point of view, and as there were about fifteen respectable commercial customers waiting to see the bankist, he was naturally anxious to get through with this detrimental as smart as possible, eo without any beating about the bush he requested some information as to what purpose the advance was required. “Well” said the detrimental “1 want to go in for a spec in oats which seems to me a good thing.” “ How much do you want?” said the manager. “If you’ll excuse me a minute or so” replied the detrimental, Til reckon it up.” Five, ten, fifteen, twenty minutes passed during which the detrimental appeared to be engaged in minute calculations, and the manager got more and more fidgety lest some of the fifteen good customers waiting outside should walk off. When half an hour had elapsed the manager again blandly demanded the amount of advance required. The detrimental still pencil in hand requested a few minutes more grace, and kept figuring away for another twenty minutes, when the managerial patience was at last exhausted, and he asked his visitor cither to “show his hand,” or “ call again.” “ My dear sir,” said the detrimental politely, “ I owe you a thousand apologies for taking up so much of your valuable time, but the fact is, upon mature consideration, I don’t think that I require auy advance just now. I’ve been reckoning things up, and I find I’ve half a bushel of oats in stock, and another bushel coming down per Maori. Good morning.” Now what I just want to know is what that manager said after the detrimental cleared out, and whether any fellow wanting an advance upon medium security would bo likely to get it that day. Do you feel as though you liked'the opera? I do. I'm not going to talk about Satanella or Maritana or such like, because I fin'd that every one I talk to knows a sight more about operatic music than I do. It’s a fact. I’ll give my word, it’s not of much value, but it’s all I’m worth, that if Mr Allen had stopped on here another month he could have learned more about music than ever he heard before. We can prance round most countries in the musical department any time, I want to observe that sitting in the rear of the pit it has struck me that professionals have rather the pull on amateurs. I don’t mean in point of merit; that goes without saying, but in the matter of being able by means of accessories practice, and natural talent, to be more at their ease in following Hamlet’s advice to “ suit the action to the word, the word to the action.” At our amateur entertainments we don’t do this. We act far otherwise usually. I have heard a man of sixteen, stone sing “ Put me in my Little Bed.” I have heard a feeble youth who would run if a spirited mouse came in contact with him, requesting the audience to “ Let him like a Soldier Fall.” This is “ o’er-stepping the modesty of nature.” At our concerts we must have some '* strutting and bellowing,” but let us by all means, if possible, avoid making our sentimental songs comic ones. Why our musical Falstaffs should attempt the part of Hamlet, and our melancholy Jacques go in for the Touchstone business is more than I can say. I shouldn’t have mentioned the subject only; the winter entertainments are coming on, and I can’t bear <oo much comic business —at least not for si- pence,

You appear to like girls. I judge so from the fact of a recent leader of yours advocating more education for them and otherwise burnishing so to speak for the feminine gender. I don’t blame you. I like girls myself. I take a deep interest in their welfare. The welfare of pretty girls seems to me more fraught with interest than the rest of them. Does it strike you in this way ? But we will not argue this point. Let us rather put them all on one common basis and seek to excelsiorate them. I have no wish to disparage our boys, only at present they run mostly in cither one of two grooves. The youth who knows Greek, Latin, French, and Trigonometry, who can draw historical parallels between Semiramis and Mrs Gamp, and give the physical geography of Kaiapoi, represents the patrician, while the gentle youth who smokes his vesper pipe by the Wesleyan chapel, and who can give me or any other man thirty-five years and a beating in profanity, represents the proletarian. They are both being cared for, but the “ fair seek ” is not looked after as it should bo ; at-least, not the colonial portion of the fair seek. Imported d6moiselles go into service, , rule their raissusses with a rod of iron, marry a cockatoo, and live happily for ever afterwards ; but the rising colonial damsel is neglected. If the Board of Education could see its way, as you truly observe, to start a ladies’ college, we might improve a bit; but, failing this, a scholarship or two for darning socks and boiling potatoes would improve the status of our gladsome girls, and perhaps that of the community generally. I don’t care what they do so long as the girls are cared for. I’m precious near heart-broken about them, and I see you are too. When they grow up they can take care of themselves—at least generally they can I find ; but, if no one else will write up for the girls, why we will, and—l hope the sin will be laid to the paper and not to us. I invariably read the reports on the Licensing Court with the deepest interest. I know you won’t believe me, but anything connected with drinks has ray sympathy. It is, however, a subject, which in a community like ours is too familiar to all, from the highest to the lowest, to require any comment from the likes of me. The licensing, topic is a very absorbing one. I feel, perhaps, I had better let it alone. I shall confine myself to the remark that I hope Mr Holloway will observe that statement of Mr Pender’s" about a house which contains sixteen bed-rooms, but where at times some of the lodgers sleep in the stables. There must be a sleepy air about this house which would delight Sandro Panza, and must be very attractive to strangers. There are such a lot of things I could show Mr Holloway. I should like him to go away with a good idea of this province. In the panorama which on his return he will exhibit we suppose, to the British agriculturist, let us by all means appear in as attractive colors as possible. Let us, during Mr Holloway’s stay at lertst, do our level best to appear a sober, moral, and prosperous community. Let us endeavour so to behave before Mr Holloway that he may give the British people a good certificate of our character, and if I could be of any service in showing Mr Holloway how much we hunger for working men, and how much more we thirst for monied immigrants, I’ll gladly spend a day with him any time he likes.